


Implausible Equations

by china_shop



Series: Waltzverse [3]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Coming Out, Con Artists, Female Friendship, Gen, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-06
Updated: 2015-06-06
Packaged: 2018-04-03 03:03:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4084141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/china_shop/pseuds/china_shop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>A threesome with a con artist. It was a disaster waiting to happen. A disaster already in motion. But El looked so happy. "Congratulations," Yvonne said again, more firmly this time. "Just don't move too fast, okay? Don't give him your bank account details or anything."</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Implausible Equations

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to EliseM for the title, mergatrude for beta and first reading, and Sherylyn for Ameripicking.

Yvonne poured a glass of pinot gris from the open bottle in the staff refrigerator, made a plate of leftover stuffed mushrooms and savory petit fours, and some crackers with peanut butter, and settled in to work on her spreadsheets. It was Friday afternoon, and the stars had aligned so she didn't have any events this weekend. She'd even been able to let Jeannie leave early.

It had been a fantastic week: the Kumble dinner had gone off without a hitch, Sheri Maddison's anniversary party was booked into a venue and well in hand, and best of all, El had stopped by Monday morning to say she was coming back to work. Everything was finally going back to normal: Burke and Coleman against the world! 

Yvonne sipped her wine and grinned to herself in anticipation. Then the bell above the door jangled, and her smile slipped. It was three-thirty on a Friday—it had better not be a client! She stood up to peer over the screen that shielded her desk, separating the office area at the back from the showroom proper.

It wasn't a client. It was El with little Mikey in his baby carrier. "Hi, Yvonne?"

"El!" Yvonne waved and reached down to click the shortcut she'd made on her desktop. A second later, the distinctive drum beat and opening guitar chords of Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" rang out through the showroom speakers.

El laughed. "Perfect. (You hear that, babycakes? Yvonne's playing your favorite.) But we should probably save it for when we really need it."

"Noted," said Yvonne, pausing her iTunes. "How are you? I didn't expect to see you today."

"I know." El pulled up a chair and sat down, then bent to see Mikey's face. "(Hey, MonsterPants, you okay there? Okay, good.)" She held his hand and smiled at Yvonne. "Sorry, I should have called ahead. I was hoping I could take you out for coffee or something."

Yvonne held up her wineglass. "Way past that."

"Oh, well, that's fine. I just need to talk to you." She seemed strangely nervous, and Yvonne hoped like hell she hadn't changed her mind about coming back to work.

"What's up?" Yvonne stood up. "You want a glass?"

"No, I can't. Breastfeeding. I'm fine." El waved her back into her seat. "Okay, it's just—" She took a breath. "Do you know anyone living in a ménage à trois?"

Yvonne frowned, confused. Had El found them a new client? "No."

"Well, you do now." El pointed to herself. Her happily-married-with-baby self.

"I don't get it," said Yvonne.

"It's not a joke. Well, maybe a cosmic one? This is me coming out to you." El was wearing a hopeful smile, clutching little Mikey's hand.

Yvonne smiled back automatically. "Congratulations! But I still don't get it. You're—?"

"Peter and I are in love with someone else."

"Wow! Just like that? Or—" Maybe it had been going on for ages. She and El hadn't talked much in the last year. Maybe El was coming out now to make her return to work easier. Yvonne quelled her kneejerk confusion. "That's great, El. How exciting! Who is she? I can't wait to meet her."

"Him. His name's Victor. Victor Moreau."

Yvonne blinked. El had said she was coming out, so she'd assumed. But it was another man? _Peter Burke_ was in love with a man? That was—unexpected.

"Well, that's the name he's using now. You've already met him, actually," continued El. "Remember Peter's CI, Neal?"

"The con artist who died. You named the baby after him." Yvonne got a sinking feeling, confirmed by El's next words.

"He didn't die." El dug an old teddy-bear out of the bag she was carrying and gave it to Mikey, who was starting to grumble. "(Aw, babycakes, are you tired? Here's Mozart. It's okay, I'll take you home soon.) He faked his death, changed his name and—that doesn't matter now. He was protecting us."

"El."

"And now he's back, and he's different. He's so—settled, and he's gone straight." Her eyes were shining. "He's moving in with us."

"El, he's a con artist," said Yvonne, alarmed. "You can't just believe him when he says he's changed." She'd only met Neal Caffrey a few times, but she'd seen enough to know he was smiling and slippery, too handsome for his own good. He was also completely audacious; El had relayed some hair-raising stories over the years. But then, El's taste in men was—unique. Yvonne didn't doubt Peter loved his wife, but he put his job first. He'd always been calling to say he was working late. With his CI. 

How long had this been going on?

"No, he really has," said El, buoyant and bulletproof. "It's not what you're thinking, I promise. He loves us. You should see him with Mikey. And Peter's head over heels. It's—it took us all by surprise, but it's going to be really great."

Yvonne nodded. El was her friend, and the impulse to protect her was strong, but she was also Yvonne's employer. She must have plenty of people in her life who could be the voice of reason. Yvonne would be the supportive one, there to pick up the pieces when it all fell apart. She didn't want to mar El's return to work with a disagreement.

"What do you think?" El looked eager for reassurance. Maybe she already had hidden doubts about the relationship—or maybe she just doubted Yvonne's reaction.

A threesome with a con artist. It was a disaster waiting to happen. A disaster already in motion. But El looked so happy. "I think congratulations," she said again, more firmly this time. "Just don't move too fast, okay? Don't give him your bank account details or anything."

"It's not like that," said El again.

There was no way to make her see sense. Yvonne swallowed a sigh and smiled, sharing El's pleasure as best she could. At least their friendship was safely on the periphery. "So, I take it he's going back to work with Peter at the FBI?"

"Actually, no." El bit her lip. "That's one of the reasons I wanted to tell you. He's coming to work here with us."

 

*

 

Yvonne had been a loyal employee of Burke Premiere Events for over five years, and a lot of what she loved about it was working with El, who was creative and bold, and could make even the dullest task fun. El was one hundred percent reliable; she always came through, and setbacks just made her more focused and cheerfully determined. Yvonne wanted to be El when she grew up.

And they were a great team: El did the big-picture planning and dealing with clients and staff, and Yvonne's strengths were more in the areas of coordinating with suppliers—venues, equipment hire, sound techs and security—and invoicing. El used to tease her about enjoying invoicing, but there was something neat and satisfying about entering the numbers, itemizing everything and seeing the total automatically calculated at the bottom. It was a reward for finishing a job, like a kid getting a gold star on a wallchart.

Anyway, before El moved to DC to work at the National Gallery, she and Yvonne had hired Jeannie to pick up the slack, and Yvonne had formally taken over managing BPE, but it hadn't been the same. And when the baby arrived, El disappeared into a whirl of motherhood and exhaustion. She'd only made contact half a dozen times, and some of those were group emails full of baby photos. 

So Yvonne had been hanging in there, running things and waiting for the day when El would come back and everything would go back to normal. 

And now El wanted to bring a con artist into the business. Yvonne didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Does he have any experience?"

"Well, he's great at managing people," said El. "He has excellent taste. He's been living in Paris for the last year."

Yvonne's sense of foreboding grew. 

El's face fell. "You think it's a bad idea." 

"Honestly, I think it's a bad business decision," said Yvonne, as gently and diplomatically as she could. "We can't afford another top-level position. What we need is another Jeannie. And a con artist—Okay, I get that you trust him, and he's going by a different name, but if word gets out, it could spook our clients."

"I'm willing to take that risk," said El. "He's great. Sheri Maddison will be falling all over him."

Yvonne held up her hands. "It's your business. If this is what you want to do—"

"I do," said El. "(Shush, shush, sweetie. Just a little longer, I promise.) And he'll pull his own weight. We'll be covering his salary in no time."

They'd have to. Margins were already tight. Yvonne nodded and forced an encouraging smile. "So, you're going to be his boss?"

"I was thinking partners," said El. "All three of us. I can't do this without you, Yvie, and I really want it to work."

"Oh, El, you know I love you, but I don't know if—" Yvonne stopped and took a deep breath. "It's a generous offer. I'll have to think about it." She felt wooden, saying it, but she couldn't help it. The future she'd anticipated was slipping away, and being offered a co-partnership with Neal Caffrey felt like salt in the wound. And if she turned it down, he'd outrank her. Oh hell.

"Of course." El sounded disappointed. "Look, Neal—Victor. He's away right now, but he gets back on Wednesday. Let's have lunch after that, and you and he can get to know each other, okay? We'll take it from there."

"Sounds great," said Yvonne, as sincerely as she could. "(Hey, little Mikey. I'll see you then too, I'm sure.) I really am happy you're so happy."

"I know you are." El stood up and hugged her side-on around the baby. "You're the first person I've told." They smiled at each other awkwardly for a moment. "Well, I really should get this little guy home. I'll see you next week."

"Can't wait," said Yvonne. But once El and Mikey had departed, she went to the staff fridge and refilled her wineglass with a frown.

 

*

 

"What am I going to do?" she wailed at her roommate and best friend, Hannah, later that evening.

Hannah passed the potstickers and sat back, crossing her long legs. "A few days ago, you were all 'Happy is the head that shares the crown.'"

"Yeah, well, this crown ain't big enough for the three of us." Yvonne chewed a potsticker dolefully and kicked her heel against the concrete. They were sitting on old beanbags on the roof of their apartment block, with a beer crate for a table. "For months, I've been wishing El would come back to work, and now she is, I have to choose between going into business with a conman and working for one."

"Well, you could quit, but it's not a great time to be unemployed," said Hannah. "Grand Central has reached maximum capacity for street performers."

"I like my job! I like El!" Yvonne huffed. "I don't want to let her down."

"You also like your credit rating, your bank balance, and the good opinion of your clients." Hannah held up her chopsticks and smirked. "All your problems would go away if you got rid of the guy. You could split them up."

"I—No. That would be evil. I don't want to be the anti-cupid." But she couldn't help snickering at the thought: it would solve all her problems. But it would break El's heart too; she'd been so happy and excited talking about him. "Maybe he really has changed."

Hannah's eyes narrowed in her normally placid face, and she fought the slumpiness of her beanbag to sit up. "Oh, no. I don't care if it's a promotion, I'm not letting you become business partners with a con artist. What kind of friend would I be? And what will you tell the police when he rips off all your rich clients and disappears?"

Yvonne winced. "It wouldn't be the police; it'd be the FBI." 

"They'd say you should've known better, and they'd be right. If you're going to throw your life down the toilet, at least do it in style: spend all your savings on male hookers and blow. Or take me to Atlantic City for a weekend of wild partying and lose it all at roulette. That'd be way more fun than letting some asshole clean you out." Hannah was subsiding back into the beanbag's saggy embrace. "And speaking of savings, you have to think of Apartment 35B."

Her dream home, the mythical Apartment 35B, with its molded plaster ceilings and reliable plumbing. She'd been scrimping and saving since her twenty-third birthday, and she was so close to having a deposit for a decent two-bedroom. Hannah was going to move in with her and pay rent to help with the mortgage. They were going to get a cat. 

Yvonne couldn't afford for anything to go wrong now, and she couldn't afford to be unemployed either. She covered her face with her hands. "Don't quote me, but damn, do other people's relationships suck!"

"From someone who spends most of her life organizing wedding receptions and anniversary parties, that is the least surprising pronouncement ever," said Hannah. "Here, have the rest of the Szechuan chicken. It'll make you feel better."

Yvonne took the chicken and poked at it, but she'd lost her appetite. "Maybe we're overreacting. Maybe we're subconsciously homophobic, and we don't like the threesome thing, but we don't want to admit it to ourselves, so we're obsessing about the con artist thing instead."

Hannah let out an incredulous snort and threw a balled-up napkin at her. "Are you kidding me? The threesome thing is hot! And think about it—would you be reacting any differently if El wasn't married? If she were single, and she'd met this guy in a grocery store, and he'd seduced her, and now she wanted to give him a third of her business?"

"That would be worse." Yvonne closed her eyes. Peter Burke might be a workaholic, but he was a cautious, risk-averse one. And usually a pretty good judge of character, from what Yvonne could tell. His involvement was actually the most reassuring aspect of the whole affair. Without him… "So, so much worse."

"You're not subconsciously homophobic, you're subconsciously sensible," said Hannah. "At least, I hope you are. Otherwise 35B is going to be a cardboard box."

 

*

 

Over the weekend, Yvonne made a plan, and on Monday she carried it out, point by point. She went to the bank and improved the security on both of her accounts. She bought an RFID-blocking wallet. At work, she deleted her cache and scoured all personal information from her computer; no more Facebook, no more internet banking. It felt like preparing for war or a siege. She still hadn't decided what she was going to do, but at least if she was prepared, she had options.

Jeannie texted to say she was running late, and by the time she arrived, it was nine-thirty and a new client was due to arrive any second, so there was no time to tell her the news. "I need to have a private chat with you after the Farnsworth meeting," said Yvonne, as the bell above the door jangled, "but right now, we need coffee and cookies."

Jeannie bit her lip, but she just said, "Coming right up."

Anna Farnsworth was a smiling bride-to-be in her mid-twenties, accompanied by her mother, Irina, and her younger sister, Tatiana. Yvonne greeted them and they all sat on the couches in the front of the showroom and leafed through the photo album of previous weddings arranged by BPE. "Of course, we'll tailor the occasion to whatever you want, but this gives you an idea of the range of styles we've worked in before," said Yvonne. "How big is your guest list?"

"I'm not sure yet." Anna glanced at her mother, her smile faltering. 

Irina sniffed. Her hair was pulled back in a severe bun, and she'd been silent up until now, sitting with her arm around her older daughter. 

"This is about Dad and Kathy, isn't it?" said Tatiana. "You have to invite Dad. If he doesn't come, that's his loss, but if you don't invite him, it's yours." 

Anna looked down at the open album on her lap, with its photo of a bride, groom and their respective parents at the Sunset Terrace at Chelsea Piers. "I don't know. I can't confirm numbers yet." 

Her mother, Irina, patted her hand. "It's your happy day, Anna, and it's up to you who you invite. I will say only this: your father loves you. And the more people you share your happiness with, the more happiness you will have."

Coming from the mouth of this stern older woman, the sentiment was unexpected; it sounded like something El would say. And when Anna dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief, Yvonne's temper rose, along with an impulse to defend Anna's reluctance. Why should she invite her father if she didn't want to? 

Yvonne blinked and pressed her lips together, struck by a realization: she was angry at El, not Irina. El, who'd invited an unwanted guest into the business, ruining everything and putting Yvonne in an impossible position. El, whose priorities had shifted away from the shared sphere of Burke Premiere Events, first to a dream job in DC, and then to motherhood and a new love. It hurt being left behind without a second thought.

But that was an emotional overreaction. Yvonne put her own feelings aside and focused on the family in front of her. "You don't need to decide the guest list now, but we will need a headcount before we can give you a quote. Aside from anything else, it affects what venues are suitable."

Anna nodded and leaned her head on her mother's shoulder. "We'll talk about it later."

 

*

 

The Farnsworths left, and Yvonne sat on the couch a little longer, eating a cookie and staring into space. Fighting the urge to become the anti-cupid after all. 

Jeannie came to clear away the coffee cups, but instead she sat down and twisted her hands together. "Yvie, what did you want to talk to me about?"

Yvonne shook herself out of her reverie. "El came by on Friday to tell me we have a new employee starting next week, as well as her."

Jeannie's hand settled over the slight swell of her belly. "Oh, phew! I thought with El coming back, you were going to let me go."

"No, the opposite," said Yvonne. "We're expanding. Sorry for giving you a fright."

"It's okay. So who's the new person?"

Yvonne scrunched her nose. She couldn't betray El's confidence or risk BPE's reputation, but she refused to leave Jeannie unforewarned. "His name is Victor Moreau. El really likes him, but—just between you and me, you need to be careful around him, okay?"

"Is he sleazy?" Jeannie grimaced back at her. "He wouldn't hit on a pregnant woman, would he?"

"Not sleazy, no," said Yvonne. "He used to be a thief. El says he's completely reformed, but. Just be careful. There are two computers, so you and I can share one desk, and El and N—Victor will share the other. And let's not leave him alone with clients till we're sure of him."

"Okay. Full alert on the down-low," said Jeannie, tapping her nose conspiratorially. "Wow, it's going to be a full house with four of us."

"Plus an eight-month-old. But El's only coming back part-time," said Yvonne. "I'm not sure about Victor. I guess we'll see." They segued into talking about the list of baby equipment El had emailed through for little Mikey, and Yvonne relaxed a little. She'd done her duty by Jeannie. Now all they could do was wait to meet Victor Moreau.

 

*

 

The rest of the week was busy, and Yvonne didn't have time to dwell on the approaching dilemma. Before she knew it, it was Thursday lunchtime. El and Neal/Victor arrived just as Jeannie was leaving for an ultrasound appointment, and they said hello in the doorway.

Victor was wearing the baby carrier today, with Mikey looking around and kicking his legs vigorously. The baby's green and blue jumpsuit contrasted with Victor's jeans and white shirt. Victor wasn't wearing a hat or a fancy suit like the last time Yvonne had met him, and he had a beard now, but she was determined not to be misled by superficial changes. Disguises were part of a con artist's stock-in-trade.

Anyway, it was actually El's transformation that was the more eye-catching. She'd always been cheerful and confident, but now she was like that on steroids, obviously walking on air. She made a show of introducing Victor to Jeannie and then handed the baby bag to Victor, touching his hand and beaming up at him as if the sun shone out of his ass.

Yvonne gave herself a mental kick. There was no use being jealous of El's attention, and she couldn't afford to let her feelings cloud her judgment. She had to see clearly. 

She went and took salad and quiche from the fridge, and put the quiche in the microwave.

The bell over the door rang again as Jeannie left for her appointment. El pointed Victor to a clear corner near the client couches, and he took the baby mat from the bag and spread it out. Yvonne could see him talking to Mikey as he unclipped the carrier. Meanwhile, El came over to Yvonne with a bright smile. "Yvonne, hi!" she called. "We're here. How's it going?"

"Great," said Yvonne. "I got us some lunch. I'm just heating the quiche."

"Fabulous. That salad looks delicious." El glanced quickly over her shoulder and lowered her voice. "Listen, I know you're still unsure about Victor joining BPE—" She paused, as if hoping Yvonne would contradict her, then continued, "but just so you know, I may have overhyped event management as a career. I was worried he'd think it was boring after solving mysteries and fighting crime with Peter, so I—I don't know." She gestured ruefully.

"A lot of it _is_ routine," said Yvonne. "That's true of any job."

"I know." El threw up her hands. "I'm being ridiculous. Ignore me. I just want us all to have a good time and make great parties together."

Yvonne grinned, despite herself, and shook her head. "You are being ridiculous, but if it makes you feel better, I promise not to wax lyrical about the joys of invoicing _too_ much."

Even if it were an opportunity to put Victor off. 

"You're the best." El laughed and glanced back again. "Everything okay, boys?"

"Base camp is all set up," said Victor, pulling Mikey's bear, a plastic rattle and a board book out of the bag. "Edmund Hillary here wants to explore the terrain, but I told him he has to check his supplies first. (Don't you, Monster? Hey, no, we're not going over there. Why don't we check the log book instead? Oh, no, look, there's a snow storm coming. Help me secure the tent.)"

"Aren't they adorable?" El murmured to Yvonne. "I don't know how I got so lucky."

Yvonne bit her tongue and prepared the lunch tray, and they took it over to the client area, along with a carafe of juice.

"Yvonne, you remember Victor." El sat down with Mikey, and Victor stood up and dusted himself off, smiling. 

"Good to see you again." He held out his hand, giving Yvonne no choice but to shake it.

"I'll take over here, so you two can talk," said El, from the play mat. "(No, babycakes, that's not for eating. Are you hungry? You want a banana? Wait, where do you think you're going?)"

She looked so adorable trying to reason with her determinedly adventurous son that Yvonne couldn't help grinning; it was like a much cuter version of her managing a difficult client, reminding Yvonne of the old days. 

"Thanks for organizing lunch," said Victor, from behind her. "This looks great."

That broke the spell. Yvonne turned away from El and found Victor filling two plates with food. He took one to El and got her a glass of water from the kitchenette at the back of the office, while Yvonne helped herself to quiche and forced herself not to follow him to make sure he wasn't stealing anything. He wouldn't make his move yet; not with El right here. 

And then Yvonne and Victor were sitting—out of earshot of El if they spoke quietly, and anyway, she was distracted with Mikey. 

"El is one of my favorite people in the world," started Yvonne.

Victor met her eye. "That's something we have in common."

And Yvonne really looked at him for the first time. He wasn't the bogeyman of her imaginings, and he was obviously just as head-over-heels as El was. He seemed at once confident and vulnerable—but maybe that was a con artist trick. Yvonne sighed. "I really want her to be right about you. But I've been thinking about it, and running a business like this is the opposite of a con. We're all about long-term relationships, honesty, reliability, keeping our clients and vendors happy. Sometimes it's tedious."

"I'm up for it," said Victor. He eyed her as he ate a bite of his quiche, then he leaned forward and lowered his voice. "You were hoping when El came back that everything would go back to how it used to be."

"You read minds now, too?" Yvonne narrowed her eyes.

Victor shrugged. "It's human nature. But you can't go back, and that's not because of me. It's because of Mikey. El's a mom now, and trust me, you're going to be glad of a third—or fourth—pair of hands."

"You're like an iTunes upgrade," snapped Yvonne, before she could think better of it.

"Ouch."

"They always claim it's an improvement, but most of it's about selling stuff, and the rest is just change for change's sake." She shook her head. "But it doesn't matter, you're not here for me."

"I want to help." He was being reasonable, keeping his voice down. Stubbornly refusing to waver. "Look at it this way, El and I can handle the clients, and you can spend more time behind the scenes."

"That sounds like a demotion."

Victor raised his eyebrows. "I thought it's what you'd want. Your desk is like a fortress, and you've got client meetings underlined three times on your wall planner. Not exactly the hallmarks of an extrovert."

"What I like is working with El," said Yvonne, unsettled. "And you're—" She trailed off. She couldn't accuse him outright of planning to steal from El's business.

His head went down anyway, as if he'd heard the unspoken charge. He took a breath. "Look, I get it. You have good reason not to trust me."

"Everything okay, you guys?" called El from across the room. She seemed to be dissuading Mikey from investigating the showroom stereo equipment.

"We're good," Victor assured her. "You need anything?"

"Maybe a tranquilizer dart," said El, picking up her son and placing him back on the mat. He immediately started back toward the stereo, and El had to head him off again. She threw a laughing glance at Neal. "I think he's inherited Peter's tenacity."

"That should be interesting when he's a teenager."

Yvonne looked between them, from El's warm, loving grin to Victor's answering one, both of them talking about their future together without doubt or reservation. _The more people you share your happiness with…_ murmured the ghost of Irina Farnsworth. Maybe this was a cosmic joke after all.

Yvonne gave Victor a wry smile. "Con me."

He sat back. "What?"

"Con me," she repeated. "Convince me you're the right person for the job."

Victor sighed, then gave her a lopsided smile. "I'll go one better. I'll bet you."

"Bet me what?" There was nothing he'd want that she was prepared to wager.

"A ninety-day trial. Forget the partnership for now; I'll be an intern. No sleeping my way to the top. And in three months, if you want me to quit, I'll go, no questions asked." He held up a hand and inclined his head. "I'll make it right with El. It won't come back on you."

Yvonne frowned. "How is that a bet?"

"Bet you won't want me to go." He grinned, not a shiny, charming grin, but something sincere and friendly, as if he was seeing her. And in that moment, just for a second, she believed him.

 

*

 

"Hey, how was your meeting with the conman?" asked Hannah, when Yvonne got home that night. It was late—Yvonne had been working, coordinating a book launch—and Hannah was lying on the couch, watching one of the _Bring It On_ movies on TV.

Yvonne dumped her bag and kicked off her shoes. "Surprisingly okay. I want to make you a proposal."

"Oh lord, one meeting with him, and you're trying to sell me beachfront property in Florida." She closed her eyes in despair.

"It's not about him. And I was thinking a different kind of property." If she wanted to be like El when she grew up, she had to be brave, take chances, open her arms and embrace the future. And there was no time to start like the present. "When we move, instead of you paying me rent, how about we buy Apartment 35B together?"

Hannah's eyes flew open. "I don't have enough for a deposit." 

"Whatever you have, whatever you can put in, we'll figure it out so it's fair." Yvonne was good at spreadsheets; they could do this. "If you want." 

Hannah started to smile. "That would be awesome."

"Great!" Yvonne produced a half-bottle of wine that had been left over from the book launch. "Toast?"

"L'Chaim." Hannah reached for the bottle and took a swig. "I know I'm going to regret saying this, but that conman might be a good influence."

Yvonne shoved her friend's feet aside so she could sit on the couch and reclaimed the bottle. "I told you, it wasn't him. It was El."

"Either way." Hannah grinned, then a shout from the TV caught her attention, and she nudged Yvonne with her foot. "Ooh, this is the good part. Just watch."

 

END


End file.
